Category: Journalism

Zoeller Sues to Find Author of Web Post – washingtonpost.com

This may be the first  Internet defamation case of a public figure in what I have been calling the application of media law to the public. Here, a defamatory allegation of drug and family abuse was added to the Wikipedia entry of golfer Fuzzy Zoeller. As a public figure, he’d have to meet the high standard of “actual malice:”

• Are the allegations true? (who knows)
• Are they defamatory? (probably yes in this case)
• Were they published? (While technically anyone on the Internet could have read the Wikipedia article, there is a remote chance that this question could turn on how many people accessed the article while the defamatory words were posted.  If they were deleted by the first person to load the page, there is a possibility it might not be considered “published.”)
• Was Zoller identified? (clearly)
• Finally, was it published with “wreckless disregard for the truth?”

This last part is the tricky one. Under the standard of actual malice, reporters and publishers will usually attempt to show that the defamatory words were published after a good-faith effort to verify their truth. However, without the usual forms of editorial review that preceed conventional publication, it might not be so easy to maintain this legal standard. Even if there have been public figure defamation cases involving anonymous speech (I’m not aware of any), there likely has always been a reviewing publisher who could act as the target of the suit.

As media law becomes applied to the publishing public, can these legal rules built under the assumptions of traditional publishing be maintained?

For some reason, the topic of kids’ exposure to indecent material on the net has been a hot topic lately.

Stefanie Olsen at CNet, doesn’t have much of an answer to why an old study has suddenly received a good deal of coverage…but this was the first time I heard just how old this research was.

Also on CNet is a good piece on kids perceptions of watching TV and video in the world of YouTube.

Finally, creating a .xxx zone on the internet might be seen as similar to (legally permissible) “red light” districts in the real world. An .xxx TLD would make it a great deal easier to block content that a parent might not want their child to see. This article has a good overview of the pros and cons in this debate: X-rated content may get dedicated home in cyberspace – Network World

Update

Another story from CNet

Times Withholds Web Article in Britain – New York Times

Here’s an interesting note about how the Times blocked an article from IP addresses within Britain because it contained information that might prejudice an English jury. Kudos to the Times for coming right out and admitting the block.

The problem with this action is the type of precedent it might set. Would I be liable for the same offense if I posted the same info on my blog, which is available to all of England. What about a more prominent blogger? It’s interesting to think in this case about what separates the Times as an institutional speaker from less notable (but, in theory, just as accessible to the public) publishers.

In what appears to be little-reported in the U.S. media, the BBC reports:

A US businessman has been charged with offering broadcasts of Hezbollah’s al-Manar satellite television station to customers in the New York-area.

It appears from this report that this individual is being charged with “doing business with a terrorist entity” because of his rebroadcasting of Hezbollah news broadcasts. What is interesting about this is that the broadcasts are news (which may not be balanced, but certainly political speech), and that this is not an individual speaking but rather a business (and as a rebroadcast, it’s not the individual’s own speech). It’s also not immediately clear from the reports whether any money had been given to Hezbollah, or if the spreading of their messages was considered the offense. More charges are said to be pending, so there will certainly be more about this soon.

Edit: it looks as though some of the US media has picked up on it…just not my rss aggregator.